Uphill and Down

Some days I feel like Sisyphus, some days I feel like the rock.

Editing:
0 hours 0 minutes

Words from sprints:
Magic II – 1,289
Wandering Wizards – 979

Untimed words:
Magic II – 425

Total New words:
Magic II – 1,712
Wandering Wizards – 979

I’m starting to notice a pattern. My weeks always start out good, but after Wednesday all bets are off. Last week I got zero editing in and while it doesn’t really make a difference for Magic II it certainly mucks up the progress for Wandering Wizards.

During one of my word sprints I started writing a scene in WW where one of the characters was having a flashback, and when I continued the scene later on I felt like a lot of this scene was just padding – how important was it to the story? That’s the point where I should have buckled down to some hard core editing.

Instead I switched my attention to Magic II, which is why I have twice the words written for it as I do WW. Because M-II is still in the first draft stage, there’s not a lot of editing to be done – I’m saving it for when the draft is completed. Tempting as it is to edit as I go along, I think it would be a wasted effort because I’m not following an outline, I just know where the story is going and let the characters take me there.

For instance…the male main character was having a drink at the club with his friend after a game of racquetball and suddenly remembered he was supposed to meet his mother for lunch. I didn’t even know he had a mother! And I knew he was rich, but she apparently owns the hotel they were having lunch at.

I missed my poetry post last week – I just didn’t have the energy. Thursday I got one sprint in, and that was it for the week. I don’t usually expect to get much done on Fridays – it’s a busy day for me – but Saturday is my big editing day. This Saturday, however, I was on the road to Huntsville to a wedding and we didn’t get back until 8 or 9, and who feels like editing at that time of night?

Yesterday got off to a slow start, as most Sundays do. The daughter and her family come to dinner on Sundays, so my afternoons are usually spent getting ready for that. This leaves the morning for writing related “stuff.”

I spent some time in my office straightening up – now that the cooler weather is here there’s no reason I can’t be spending more time in there – and then I did something I rarely do. I got my Monday blog posts written and scheduled.

That’s right, it’s Sunday morning as I’m typing this. Normally I’m typing the post for my other blog late Sunday night or, more often than not, as soon as I get up on Monday. And lately this post has been done later in the morning. And there goes my writing time on Monday mornings.

But now I have no excuse for a lack of numbers today. Time to push that rock.